[Nocturnal]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,149250,00.html

Apparently the shooter wore some type of body armor, rendering the good samaritan's gun about useless. It would have been wise to pop the bastard in the head instead (maybe he tried, I don't know) or use a long rifle at distance instead.

Mark Wilson is a true hero. What a shame that he did not survive his heroic act. I can't imagine the horror he must have felt as he saw that his pistol rounds had no effect.

Oh, I have to comment on this part:

Quote[/b] ]Only two stories mentioned that the AK-47 was a semi-automatic, not a machine gun, and, while it is understandable, none of the articles provided context by explaining that Arroyo’s weapon functioned the same as deer hunting rifles, firing the same caliber bullets, at the same rapidity, and doing the same damage

That is baloney. As far as I know people don't use semi auto rifles with pistol grips and 30 round mags to hunt deer. Short sighted comparisons like that don't do weapons rights any good. I've heard of people using SKS rifles for deer hunting but bolt action rifles with 3, 4 or 5 bullet capacity are much more common. In fact each AK bullet is far less powerful than a typical hunting round (30-06 or .308), the problem is that he had so many to go around and could easily fire them from the hip. Can't do that with a hunting rifle. A hunting rifle could have been used to take out Arroyo though.

 

[Hal8000]

I know they can in some States, but with a magazine capacity much less than 30 rounds... The 7.62x39 is very simular to a 3030 in power...

I've heard some put him down because of bad judgement... So what, one way or the other, it doesn't change the fact he's an American Hero!

 

[acrashb]

Quote[/b] (Nocturnal @ Mar. 03 2005,5:00)]That is baloney. As far as I know people don't use semi auto rifles with pistol grips and 30 round mags to hunt deer.
[...]
the problem is that he had so many to go around and could easily fire them from the hip.

1, it isn't baloney (except for the 30-round mag, that's limited in most jurisdictions for hunting purposes), people do use AK's and the like to hunt because they are cheap and good enough in the brush at close range - so I hear.

2, we should be happy the shooter went from the hip if indeed he did.  It rendered his fire wildly inaccurate and (demonstrably) ineffective in relation to the number of bullets expended.  And yes, you can shoot a traditionally-stocked rifle from the hip with equal inaccuracy.  Let's not start knocking pistol grips and feed more fuel to the anti's fire.  They're handy, and necessary with a high-butt stock that puts the butt in line with the barrel for better recoil control.  Nothing more.

You might benefit from reading this:  http://www.awbansunset.com/whyown.html

One thing we agree on, Mark Wilson is a hero.  Perhaps if he'd trained more he would reflexively have shifted to headshots after ineffective centre-of-mass shots - but I wasn't there, and second-guessing from here is too easy.